“Do you think there were people aboard those?” Cascabel asked, appearing only to Nashara. She suspected so. Cascabel nodded. “I tried to hail them, to see if I could get into their ships and spread. You?” “Destroyed before I could do anything.” The desire to multiply out into fresh, virgin lamina made Nashara shudder. A sad waste. “A waste,” Cascabel whispered. “The other three ships, one of them is the Takara Bune. I’m trying for them.” Nashara knew. “He followed us here. Something doesn’t add up with him.” “I know. I have this odd feeling. But I trust him.” Cascabel shrugged and faded away from inside the cockpit. The Xamayca Pride had dropped down and managed to get into a geosynchronous orbit several hundred miles above them. Holding the high ground and ready to power out of orbit and run for it if needed. Nashara had pulled the Toucan Too through the shield and lay in front of and just above it, and both the Starfunk Ayatollah and Chistopher Malik’s Magadog had followed a similar path.
